VNU Journal of Science: Natural Sciences and Technology, Vol. 38, No.

2 (2022) 63-69

Original Article
Using Biosurfactants from Plants to Treat Chicken Feathers
into a Green Oil Absorbent Material

Nguyen Thi Minh Xuan*, Nguyen Hoang Trung Hieu, Ta Ngoc Ly

The Danang University, University of Science and Technology, Da Nang, Vietnam
Received 29 October 2021
Revised 18 May 2022; Accepted 18 May 2022
Abstract: Though light as a feather, with the vast quantities of chickens produced annually, the
number of feathers produced is considerable. Research has shown that the feathers have
hydrophobic properties and can therefore be used to make products that absorb oil. However, the
use of large amounts of toxic detergents to clean chicken feathers in reported studies has reduced
the environmental significance of agricultural waste reuse. In this study, we evaluated the
possibility of replacing toxic cleaning agents with eco-friendly natural cleaners in the handling of
chicken feathers. Water-based extracts of soapnuts and bo-ket fruits have been selected for our
study due to their high saponin content - an effective cleaning agent, and have been used as a
dishwashing liquid or shampoo for a long-time by local housewives. Our study showed that natural
detergents derived from soapnuts have been shown the ability to remove lards on the plastic
surface, and to clean chicken feathers, thereby increasing their capacity to absorb various oils
including cooking oil, used cooking oil, and lubricant oil. We have also created an oil-absorbing
pillow containing soapnut extract-treated chicken feathers with a maximum efficiency of 16.8 g/g
in absorbing lubricant oil. Our research opens new avenues for the use and treatment of poultry
feathers, contributing to the reduction of solid waste from the poultry industry by methods which is
friendlier to the environment. The greenness of the created absorber is guaranteed.
Keywords: Plant extracts, chicken feathers, oil absorbent, natural detergent.

1. Introduction * about 11,000 poultry farms nationwide.

Poultry production in Vietnam has made
great leaps and bounds. The number of farms
and poultry farms also increased strongly.
According to the National Center for
Agricultural Extension, there are currently
_________
* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: ntmxuan@dut.udn.vn
https://doi.org/10.25073/2588-1140/vnunst.5370
63
Accompanying this development, waste from the
poultry industry is considerable. Specifically,
with more than 400 million broilers produced
each year, 0.5 to 1 million pounds of feathers
are generated.
Poultry feathers have been believed to
hold several good and reusable properties which
can be used to produce a variety of valuable
products. Research has shown that keratin
(a protein) in feathers can be used to produce a
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variety of valuable products such as pillows,
diapers, insulation, plastics, mattress covers, etc.
[1]. Indeed, feathers can be ground into powder
and added to poultry feed as a source of protein.
In addition, the ability of poultry feathers to
absorb oil waste has been reported associated
with their porous and hydrophobic
characteristics [2]. However, the feathers need to
be treated with alkaline or strong detergent to
wash out grease and other impurities on the
surface [2, 3]. Untreated waste poultry feathers
exhibited a slow sorption rate for oil. Even
though called green materials, oil-absorbent
from feathers were treated with numerous
chemicals before use. In this study, we have an
effort to use bio-surfactant extracted naturally
from plants alternative for chemicals in treating
poultry feathers. This study targets to generate
natural and completely friendly environmental
oil-absorbent material.
2. Experimental
2.1. Preparation of Detergent Solution
Soapnut extract
100 g of well-dried pericarp shell of local
soapnuts (Sapindus mukorossi) was soaked into
1L of water overnight. On the next day, the
mixture was boiled for over 25 mins. Filter to
remove residue, the clear liquid obtained is a
cleaning solution from soapnuts.
Fermented soapnut solution
The fermented soapnut solution was bought
from Tipihandmade company, which specializes
in supplying and manufacturing soapnut-based
cleaning solutions. Briefly, the mixture of 1 kg
of dried soapnut pericarp shell, 1 kg of white
sugar, 1 pineapple and 10 L of water was put in
a covered container. The solution has been going
to appear foam for about the first month, then
continue to incubate for another 2 months to get
soapy water. After around 3 months, a thick
layer of yeast biomass will appear on the surface
of the solution, The mixture was then filtered
and bottled for long-time storage.
Bo-ket fruit extract
100 g of cleaned and dried fruits of bo-ket
(Gleditsia fera (Lour.) Merr.) was grilled until
fragrant, and then boiled in 1 L of water for
about 20 minutes. The mixture was allowed to
settle and decant the upper clear water.
Commercial detergent solution
To compare the cleaning efficiency of
natural detergents, we used control of
commercial dishwashing liquid commonly used
in Vietnam. Calculating the surfactant
concentration equivalent to that in the natural
extract will give better comparative efficiency.
According to previous studies, the saponin
extract from the mixture of 1:10 of soapnut
pericarp and water ranges from 0.3-0.4 wt% [4,
5]. The surfactant content in concentrated
dishwashing liquid is usually around 30-40 wt%,
so we diluted 10 g of concentrated dishwashing
liquid into 1 L of water to get a surfactant
concentration in the range of 0.3-0.4 wt%.
2.2. The Effectiveness of the Detergent
Evaluation of foam strength and stability
50 mL of cleaning solution was stirred on a
magnetic stirrer at 800 rpm, for 1 min. After
stopping stirring for 2 min to stabilize the foam
in the solution, the volume of foam in the
column was recorded at different time points.
Cleaning action of detergent
To demonstrate the cleaning ability of bio-
detergents, the method was used with little
modification. 1.5 g of lard was applied to a
polypropylene dish, and left to dry for 5-6 hours.
The plastic dishes have measured the weight
before washing. Then, the larded dish was
washed twice for 7 mins or three times for 10
mins. Every 10 ml of different detergents was used
and then allowed dishes to dry. The weight of the
washed dish was observed as weight after
washing. The amount of lard removed is calculated
based on the difference in the weight of the same
dried plastic dish before and after washing.
2.3. Treatment of Chicken Feathers
Freshly plucked wet untreated chicken
feathers were washed 5 times with water before
deeply cleaned with various detergents.
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Untreated waste chicken feathers (5 g) feather
samples were placed in a beaker to which was
added different detergent solutions at a liquid to
solid ratio of 40:1. The sample was agitated
continuously for 10 mins to remove the grease
and other contaminants. The treated feathers
were rinsed again in distilled water 3 times and
then laid on glasses and dried to a constant mass
at around 90 - 100 °C in an air-forced dryer.
2.4. Oil Absorption Capacity of Chicken Feather
To evaluate the efficiency of the chicken
feather in absorbing oil, we stuffed a definite
amount of treated chicken feathers into 6.5x7.5
cm non-woven bags and then sealed to make the
oil absorbent pillow. The cover bags of the
pillows are made from a non-woven thin layer of
polypropylene which are waterproof, so allows
oil to pass through and contact with chicken
feathers inside. The oil-absorbing capacity of
these cover bags was also measured to eliminate
their influence on the proving of the oil-
absorbing ability of chicken feathers.
The oil absorbent pillow containing 1 g each
of treated whole chicken feathers was dispersed
in a beaker containing 100 ml water and 50 ml
of various oils including cooking oil (sunflower
oil), used cooking oil from restaurants and
lubricant oil [2, 3]. The oil absorption
experiments were carried out at room
temperature for 1 min. The pillows were then
picked up with forceps and allowed to drain for
2 mins until oil began to slowly stop dripping
from the pillows. The weight of the pillow was
recorded (Final weight) and the amount of oil
absorbed per unit mass was calculated based on
equation (1):
2.5. Statistics Analysis
To validate and verify the results, SPSS
software was used for statistical analysis. Two-
way Anova was employed to assess the effect of
treated solutions and the kind of oil on the
absorbent capacity of treated chicken feathers.
65
All measurements described with mean ± S.D
were from at least three replicates.
3. Results and discussion
3.1. Bio-detergent Evaluation
3.1.1. The Foaming Capacity
The cleaning power is not from foam itself,
but foam keep detergents stay longer on the
surface. Therefore, it allows the cleaning agents
to penetrate into dirties and remove them better.
For this, one of the properties of detergents often
evaluated is their ability to create and hold foam.
The results in Figure 1 show that both fermented
and non-fermented soapnut extracts have better
foaming capacity than either commercial
dishwashing liquid and bo-ket fruit extract
solution. And the foam stability of the soapnut
extract is much longer. This is related to the
presence of saponins in the soapnut and bo-ket
fruit extract [6, 7]. In the case of fermented
soapnuts extract, foaming can also be caused by
substances produced by microorganisms.
In the section of materials and methods, we
have mentioned the calculation of saponin
concentration in the extract based on previous
studies. This is a basis for the preparation of
other cleaning solutions with comparable
concentration of surfactants. The foam
properties of soapnut extract in Figure 2 are
completely consistent with the foam behavior of
solutions containing 0.3 to 0.4 wt% purified
saponin as illustrated in the study by Nurudeen
Yekeen et al., 2020 [7].
Figure 1. Evaluation of foam strength and stability of
natural detergents in the comparison to commercial
dishwashing liquid. SN: soapnut extract.
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This result once again confirms the
correction of our calculation, with the saponin
concentration in the soapnut extract falling in the
range of 0.3-0.4 wt%.
3.1.2. The Cleaning Effectiveness of
Bio-detergent
The ability to make foam is not an important
factor in proving the cleaning action of a
detergent, but sometimes just creating a feeling
for consumers. In the next experiment, we have
investigated the ability to remove grease of
natural detergent on high-adhesive surfaces such
as polypropylene plastic. 1.5 g of lard was
applied to polypropylene dishes and allowed to
dry naturally for 6 hours before being soaked
and washed with various detergents. The
difference between the weights of the plate
before and after being washed was used to
determine the amount of lard that was removed
by the detergents.
The results in Figure 2 illustrated the
degreasing capacity of fermented and
non-fermented soapnuts extracts compared with
bo-ket fruit extracts. Interestingly, the cleaning
ability of the non-fermented soapnuts extract was
much more effective (0.70±0.14 g) than that of the
fermented ones (0.25±0.07 g). This can be
explained by the microbial activity present on the
surface of soapnuts that degraded saponins during
the fermentation process [8]. Our studies have
gone against the habit of using fermented soapnut
water (preparing for 1 month) of Vietnamese
housewives in terms of cleaning efficiency
compared to fast soapnut extract (preparing for
1 day). Even so, more thorough studies on the
safety of soapnut extract are needed before it can
be popularized as a daily cleaning product. Some
saponins can form insoluble complexes with
cholesterol membranes and thus form permeable
holes in the red blood cell membranes, causing
membrane lysis and loss of hemoglobin in animals
[9-11]. Studies have shown that some saponins can
be toxic to insects and cold-blooded animals [12].
Soapnut fruit extract was also lethal to glasshouse
whitefly at a concentration of 88 ppm [13].
Fermentation of soapnut extracts probably convert
a toxic form of saponin to a less toxic one [11].
In this study, we have investigated to use of
natural detergent to replace toxic ones such as
Sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS) which was used
in other studies [3] in removing grease from
chicken feathers. These grease stick to only a
very small amount on the feathers due to the oil
glands on the rump of the chicken and the
slaughtering operation. Although, the cleaning
activity of soapnut extracts is incomparable to
commercial dishwashing liquid, with the amount
of grease removed being around 1/2 of the
amount removed by the commercial product
(Fig. 2), SEM images demonstrated the ability to
clean chicken feathers of soapnuts extracts (Fig. 3).

Figure 2. The cleaning activity of natural detergents. A. The grease remains in plastic dishes after they have been
soaked and washed 3 times for 10 mins with various detergents. B. The graph shows the amount of lard removed
by different detergents over the different time periods. SN: soapnuts .
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Figure 3. SEM Images of un-washed (A, C) and the soapnut extract-washed feathers (B, D) with different
magnifications. Arrows indicate the grease on the chicken feather.
3.2. Chicken Feathers-oil Absorbers
3.2.1 Oil Absorbent Pillow from Poultry
Feathers
The thin and long feathers of poultry are
quite difficult to use in the real world as well as
to evaluate their oil absorption efficiency in the
laboratory, therefore we have created a pillow-
type oil absorber. In which, poultry feathers
washed by different solutions are put into
sealed non-woven bags (Fig. 4).
3.2.2 Effect of cleaning solutions on the oil-
absorbent ability of chicken feathers.
The ability of unwashed chicken feathers to
absorb oil is slow and ineffective in relation to
grease and dirt adhering to them. However, the
use of commercial and toxic cleaners in large
quantities to clean chicken feathers can lead to
adverse environmental impacts. Here, we have
evaluated the possibility of using natural
detergents derived from plant extracts which are
popular in Vietnam to treat chicken feathers for
making green oil absorber. However, cleaning by
commercial detergents appeared to be cleaner
than the one using the natural solution and
therefore significantly increased the oil absorption
capacity of chicken feathers (p < 0.01). However,
cleaning with unfermented soapnut extract shows
great potential as an alternative to commercial and
toxic cleaners. Optimizing extraction and
treatment conditions of soapnuts may increase
their cleaning efficiency (Fig. 5).
67
There is no significant difference between
chicken feathers treated with commercial dish
washing liquid and soapnut extract in absorbing
lubricant oil (p>0.5). And the amount of
lubricant oil absorbed by chicken feathers
treated with soapnut extract (14.7 g/g) is a little
less than that by chicken feathers treated with
SDS (16.21 g/g) [3], and much higher (11.33
g/g) than that of chicken feathers treated with
sodium bicarbonate (6.1 g/g) in absorbing
vegetable oil [2]. This result once again
confirms the potential of using natural cleaning
solutions as an alternative to commercial
chemical products.
3.2.3 Chicken feathers' ability to absorb
different oils
We also evaluated the capacity of chicken
feathers in absorbing the different kind of oils.
Interestingly, the ability to absorb different oils
of chicken feathers washed with commercial
dish washing liquid remained virtually
unchanged (Fig. 5). Meanwhile, the higher the
oil viscosity, the higher the oil absorption
capacity of chicken feathers treated with natural
detergents (p<0.01) (Fig. 5B). However, in the
cases of used lubricants (data not shown), the
excessive viscosity and contaminants [14]
prevented the penetration of oil into pores, so
the oil absorption efficiency is clearly reduced,
markedly in most cases.
The ability to re-absorb oil from used
pillows has been evaluated, however, the
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efficiency is quite low. This may involve
incomplete oil removal, here we used the
conventional pressing method. However, the
development direction of these studies is to use
chicken feathers to absorb oil that is difficult to
O
recover in wastewater of seafood processing
plants, then recycle chicken feathers with
absorbed oil to make feed. Therefore, the reuse
of oil-absorbing materials is not our
research goal.

Figure 4. Oil absorbent pillow from poultry feathers. (A-C), Oil-absorbing pillows containing washed chicken
feathers dipped in an oil-water mixture. (D-F), The outer cover of the oil absorbent pillow was also tested for oil
absorption, with the amount of oil absorbed being negligible. The thick arrows indicate the amount of oil that has
been sucked away by the absorbent pillow (C) or by the cover bag of the pillow only (F).

Figure 5. Effect of cleaning solutions and the kind of oil on the oil-absorbent ability of chicken feathers.
A. Column graph shows the amount of oil absorbed by the pillows containing chicken feathers treated with
different detergents, compared with commercial absorbent paper. B. The interaction plot indicates the interaction
between treated conditions and the kind of oil to the absorbent ability of chicken feathers. SN: soapnut extract.
Bo-ket fruit: Bo-ket fruit extract. OA: oil-absorbent. **, p<0.01.
 N. T. M. Xuan et al. / VNU Journal of Science: Natural Sciences and Technology, Vol. 38, No. 2 (2022) 63-69
4. Conclusion
The cleaning activity of natural detergents
including soapnut extract, fermented soapnut
extract, and bo-ket fruit extract has been
investigated and evaluated in our studies. In
particular, the soapnut extract shows potential
as an alternative to industrial cleaners and toxic
chemicals in cleaning chicken feathers on large
scale. Our research also once again confirms the
use of chicken feathers as a green oil absorber.
We have also created an oil-absorbing pillow
containing washed chicken feathers with a
maximum oil absorption efficiency of 16.8 g/g
of material. However, further studies to
improve the oil absorption efficiency of chicken
feathers need to be conducted to achieve the
same efficiency as the commercial plastic
product of 19.1 g/g.
Acknowlegement
This work was supported by the GSGES
seeds funding program (Year 2020-2021).
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